Callithrix aurita: Occurrence, allochthonous species and landscape attributes

The buffy-tufted-ear marmoset (Callithrix aurita) is a small primate
endemic to the Brazilian Atlantic Forest biome, and one of the 25 most
endangered primates in the world, due to fragmentation, loss of habitat
and invasion by allochthonous Callithrix species. Using occurrence data
for C. aurita from published data papers, we employed model selection
using Akaike Information Criterion corrected for small samples and
cumulative AICc weight (w+) to evaluate whether fragment size, distance to
fragments with allochthonous species, altitude, connectivity, and
surrounding matrices influence the occurrence of C. aurita within its
distributional range. Distance to fragments with C. jacchus (w+ = 0.94)
and non-vegetated areas (w+ = 0.59) correlated negatively with C. aurita
occurrence. Conversely, the percentage of agriculture and pasture mosaic
(w+ = 0.61) and the percentage of savanna formation (w+ = 0.59) in the
surrounding matrix correlated positively with C. aurita occurrence. The
findings indicate that C. aurita is isolated in forest fragments
surrounded by potentially inhospitable matrices, along with proximity of a
more generalist and invasive species, thereby increasing the possibility
of introgressive hybridization. The findings also highlighted the
importance of landscape elements and allochthonous congeneric species for
C. aurita conservation, besides indicating urgency for allochthonous
species management. Finally, the approach used here can be applied to
improve conservation studies of other endangered species, such as C.
flaviceps, which is also endemic to the Brazilian Atlantic Forest and
faces the same challenges.